Gee, if he thinks that Rockefeller Plaza is filled with weirdly cryptic symbolism, maybe Glenn Beck should take a tour of the Manitoba legislature…

It’s actually quite fascinating to deconstruct the iconography incorporated into architecture of previous centuries and deeply unfortunate that so-called “modernism” has completely stripped our buildings of their weirdly arcane and artful embellishments for the sake of mundane, but ultimately dehumanizing considerations championed by intellectual wankers of the hideous “International Style” of architecture that’s blighted many of our cites for the last 60 years with their wretchedly boring, glass-clad, minimalistic boxes and insufferable “machines for living.”

17 responses to “The Hermetic Code”

I saw that piece the other night on Newsworld. I was unaware the Manitoba Legislature was an edifice of such spectacular magnificence. It puts the Nova Scotia Legislature to shame. In a shopping context we are Zellers to their Harrods.

They’re all over the place. I’ve been to the Parliament Buildings many times (used to live just a few blocks way from there on Kingston and walked through it on my way into town) but I don’t think Rattenbury was quite as kooky as the architect in the news feature here. Although that’s not to say there isn’t some weird shit going on with the design, especially when approached from the rear of the buildings…

Jay — It’s hard to think of any truly iconic or memorable buildings built here after the 30s, but that’s maybe just my sense of taste.

Most of the nicest stuff simply revives the past, builds on top of it or imitates it. I have to say that it’s improved considerably since the 1950-60s that was just abysmal. But still, new buildings tend to be fairly dull and artless.

I should’ve visited NYC before DHS denied me entry for no reason my last ever attempt to visit inbred USA. Is a nearby limestone quarry, might explain the grandoise Leg. The lack of good building also dovetails with when Universal Healthcare came around so I’m glad architecture is cheapo, especially where public funded. There is a suburb of S.Korea, Seoul I think, that is planning a 70000 person city. I can’t even describe it: looks like a giant green alien octopus crash-landed upside-down and left its tentacles sticking out and functioning as skyscrapers. Japan has an underground city they probably wish wasn’t based on hydrogen fuel cells. Platinum LEED is what I look for.

Starting to realize why I hated what Duffy did last election. Was a National Security threat. You start to realize there is lots of unpublic stuff that is necessary to make a government function. One cute example, no one just leaves a tape in the washroom by accident. And the PM I assume is who co-ordinates most of this stuff, and the subordinates need to remain loyal or lots of inefficiencies crop up. For instance you lose confidence in your government. The last thing the media is supposed to do is highlight this sort of stuff, is a security risk. What our oldest private broadcaster did for no reason was to betray this faith and signal they would only serve Neocon Harper. There are no doubt lots more potential Dion out-take like events just as Harper screwed up unpublicly, no doubt with dumb Republican, and berating comments to the poor and Atlantic Canada. Maybe BCE thought Dion was weak? Chretein gave him the Unity file and he managed it to perfection, keeping Que from being an economic basketcase, and from being ripped to shreds by Indian Reserves. Keeping Canada from having a permanent Conservative Majority (banks deregulate for instance). Keeping Atlantic Canada trade linked with Canada. Keeping the Americans from having two more borders (Mohawks and Que)…..and Dion had a plan to prevent Canada from increasing AGW. What the Hell was CTV thinking?! Now we are the most evil developed nation on Earth with a dead-end fiscal, cultural and economic future. As an institution you cannot express disloyalty to a potential PM like that. Harper is inciting the Republicans into retardism and Obama can’t even address his own citizens because of their MSM that CTV desires to be. I’ve had a Corus radio station jock, one of the Greatest Canadians Ever, suggest on-air it is good if someone assaults me (see how the system breaks down if you don’t respect unpublic codes of conduct?).
For the record it is trivial to break the water main to any radio station building.

I’ll give you a hint Corus radio station vigilantes. There is something very simple you do in the summer that makes breaking a watermain as easy as pouring water in the winter time. That and crazy glue would be nice revenge if I ever get bopped in the nose.
If it is baseball bat goons with yammacas the cities of Wpg and Minneapolis will be getting the best crime fighting blueprints they’ve ever read and there will be some interesting high profile names in the news…dumb rich people.

Sorry for the hijack (I did add thread content about why you guys all can’t have a Leg: Lake Agassiz), Red. This summer one local jock implied he’d get fired by Corus if voiced true opinion about politics. While another uses his air time to drag Iggy through the mud. I pointed this out on a liblog and got branded a cockroach on-air. It isn’t where Hal said someone should give me bloody nose, it is where he said this was “probably a good thing”. Just letting the bullies know I’ll fight back.

Omar — The BC Legislature is referred to as The Parliament Buildings? That’s almost as funny as Quebec having a National Assembly.

They’re almost universally called the “Parliament Buildings” here and always have been from their inception, as far as I’m aware. Unlike the National Assembly however, it doesn’t have any real political significance.